Back To Reality
by FullMentalPanic
Summary: Waking up can be hard to get used to, especially when you're reliving your past, and that past never happened in the first place. Adopted from HazzaTL3.
1. The Conclusion Is Lacking

**Back to Reality**

_Chapter One: The Conclusion Is Lacking _

By FullMentaPanic

Original Concept HazzaTL3

For a long time he'd had a problem with closing his eyes.

Not just with falling asleep, but simply blinking. Disaster could occur in the time it took his lids to come together and open again. Death, tragedy, failure, and even when his throat felt thick and strangled with guilt, there was still more to lose. Things precious to him had already slipped from his fingers no matter how tightly he clung to them, and the things left to him seemed no more durable than what had been stolen. Wanting and striving to save guaranteed nothing.

Still he had to try. He had to do more than nothing when what meant most to him was about to be snuffed out right in front of him. He had pushed himself forward, and then when he had stepped, he didn't fall. He was a far cry from perfect and probably no one's first choice, but maybe he was enough to protect what he cherished.

Except that he hadn't been.

People were still dead directly because of what he couldn't do, and it was something he couldn't forget.

What had shocked him into that stilling awareness of reconciliation was seeing those he had fatally failed look at him with blameless smiles and bless him with life. It had lifted the weight of Gaia off his gut.

With that, closing his eyes became difficult because he feared losing what he had. Those things that had been too fragile to speak of were being loosed from his tongue and realized before his eyes.

Every so often he'd dream of being trapped, of living in a Mako haze, of seeing his friends fall around him while his brain couldn't understand enough to even make his body twitch in response. These were few and far between though. He had regrets, lots of them, although they weren't what filled him right now. He had things now that made living more than worthwhile. He had people now who made the future seem warm and bright and not something that would beat him down into a hole he didn't have the strength, or desire, or right to climb out of it. This was something he could love.

Then he blinked, and when he opened his eyes all he saw was green.

* * *

Hojo left his hand on the kill-switch while he ground his teeth in frustration. He'd considered pulling the plug on the simulation at several points, but had decided to let it proceed. At first things hadn't been too terrible. It had taken speculative years to be asserted, but the Reunion Theory had eventually begun to unmistakably show itself. Regarding the specimens the experiment was centered around, the resistance Specimen Z had shown to the inclusive effects of the Jenova cells was only further confirmed and the initial promise of Specimen C had produced catatonic results. Unfortunately his data self hadn't anticipated how those extra Jenova cells and Mako saturation had bumped the slightly more cognizant Specimen Z to the level where he could break out of containment.

Regardless of the failure both specimens had turned out to be, he hadn't been willing for them to get off the shelf of potential future usefulness and his simulated self had naturally been of the same mind. Shinra forces, though, were mobilized against the specimens more due to Z's compromising knowledge of the Nibelheim incident and general pool of information as a First Class. Though it hadn't been openly stated, it also seemed that several members of the administration were actually intimidated by Specimen Z.

Nothing of import to his main objectives had occurred until Specimen C had absorbed some of Specimen Z's memories after the latter had expired. It was a reflection of the copying powers of the Jenova cells, but it wasn't significant. He had paid little attention to the progress, or lack thereof, concerning Specimen C until the Cetra and the other Ancient creature he'd anticipated acquiring were stolen from his virtual other. For the most part though, Specimen C and the gaggle of followers trailing after him had merely bungled around the main objectives of the simulation. The obsession with Chocobo breeding, even when Meteor had blotted out a good portion of the sky, was nothing short of baffling.

They did conscript that Valentine brat into their mob and had run into Lucrecia, who had been still clearly obsessed with the seed that Hojo had placed in her to the exclusion of all else, but little of personal interest had occurred. Specimen C had even handed over the black materia to the immaculate Sephiroth and the Ancient was skewered when she'd tried to foil his son's plans.

After that...after that...

EVERYTHING had gone wrong! That failed, flawed, fraudulent Specimen C had trounced HIS son and that confounded Ancient spawned by Gast had actually had enough influence to thwart Sephiroth's plan for colliding Meteor with the Planet. It was infuriating, and he'd been as close as he'd ever been to terminating the simulation and starting over. When he had looked at the data more closely though...there were remnants. Small pieces of Sephiroth and Jenova that had been left over, and he was willing to wait and see what they could accomplish.

Again, it had taken years, but he had been delighted with the direction embarked on when the remnants had finally started to move decisively. A joining of one of the remnants and raw Jenova had been enough for Sephiroth to manifest himself again. It had been going beautifully, Sephiroth showing every bit of the power, brutality, and stunning_ presence_ that Hojo had always known he'd be capable of. Specimen C was a slashed and battered lump moments from being justly disposed of when the virtually _dead_ reprobate Specimen Z had connected with Specimen C from the Lifestream and _talked _him to his feet to again strike down what should have been the crowning achievement of humanity. Frustrating as that was, it was slightly mollifying to see C shot down. The consolation that C would be dead as well was routed even as he was being absorbed into the Lifestream when Specimen Z and the Cetra chit had pushed him out again. What's more, the Cetra had gone and completely eliminated any traces of Jenova from anywhere within or on the Planet.

The situation had seemed rather like a lost cause at that point. His abstract self had successfully merged consciousness into the data stream, however, and observing how Deepground influenced events did hold some value, so he had maintained the simulation. It had been hugely gratifying to see the path his simulated other took and the success met with, but again it was foiled. The Valentine urchin played a significant role in dashing the plans of his other, but that callow ingrate was at least still locked in the embrace of Chaos and separated from acting on that infatuation shown toward Lucrecia.

Hojo had consoled himself with the thought that Valentine would surely be suicidally depressed, but the idiot had seemed serenely accepting of the ending events. That was the final straw that had Hojo calling the whole experiment back to reality.

Specimen C was stirring and obviously attempting to break out. Hojo wasn't disturbed. While he'd let the simulation play out without any alterations or adjustments, he'd started making changes in the real world as soon as he'd seen the vector of things to come. One of those changes was to place both specimens in highly reinforced containment. Just looking at the pair of them was setting his teeth on edge, and he stomped into one of the adjoining chambers to organize his thoughts.

He'd been heavily involved in the simulators used for training in Shinra, and it had only been a few days before he'd started designing scenarios specifically pertaining to his newly acquired samples. Of course he couldn't have them engage with the simulators in the traditional way, but some experimenting with different wave frequencies had revealed ways to let the scenarios play out without removing the specimens from confinement. Specimen Z had always taken any situation he was put into head on. Specimen C was far less cooperative, and no matter how spartan of a landscape Hojo concocted, he had always found some hidden or inaccessible corner to retreat to and simply watch whatever he was supposed to be fighting. Specimen Z was extremely familiar with the Shinra simulators and likely had a better idea of what was going on, and it was possible that C hadn't had much to do with any of the training simulations. For whatever reason though, C refused to participate. After one very aggravating week, Hojo determined that it was because C knew it wasn't real. He'd be periodically dumped back into the containment tube which always let him know that he hadn't been involved in something genuine. If Specimen C was going to react to a simulation realistically, it would have to begin in his current confinement.

It had turned into an exciting and admittedly lengthy process. There was already basic data available on many of the individuals involved with Shinra that he could tap into and the excessive time Specimen Z had spent working in simulators had facilitated the process. He'd elaborated on the existing pool of information available and incorporated as many current events as possible to obtain authentic results. He'd been able to directly tap into the consciousness of the two specimens to flesh out some aspects of the duplicate reality. All in all, it had resulted in a marvelously astute replication of future events.

The future he had seen was not a desirable one.

He flipped through his notes huffily. The specimens had quickly fallen into the failure category, and though they'd initially been the focus, the rest of the simulation had been extensive and complete enough for a credible image of the future. The situation wasn't a complete waste and there were a few things salvageable. The computer absorption plan actually held some merit. He wasn't entirely behind everything that Sephiroth had been trying to accomplish, though the scope of the vision still took his breath away. He could nudge things onto the most preferable path with very little interference. Really, it was Specimen C that had definitively damaged the outcome. Thinking back, Specimen Z had come perilously close to surviving and demolishing the situation even further than those times he had provided the necessary instigation for Specimen C to defeat Sephiroth. It was regrettable after all the time he'd spent on both of them, but they'd have to be disposed of to decrease the possibility of any repeats of the objectionable material he'd seen. The simplest way would be to let poison flow into the Mako they were submerged in.

"Professor."

"Busy, no time for nonsense." A fast acting poison would be best. It would be interesting to see how long they might take to succumb to something milder, but they could also become agitated enough in attempting escape to damage their own bodies. If nothing else, he hoped to procure two well-conditioned cadavers from this.

"Professor, I only wish to admire from the sidelines. Is that too great of an inconvenience?"

He glanced back, who was that man again? Fuhito. The one who had tried to convince to him join up with the AVALANCHE group but hadn't been able to pull off a kidnapping properly. At least he had good taste, it was mildly flattering. "Stay if you want, just don't get in the way."

"Certainly, sir, I would never dream of derailing one of your works of genius."

Fuhito always had seemed the sort to give proper credit. Hojo had spent several months programming at least the basic personality traits of a fair number of people he was familiar with to supplement the simulation. As he recalled, Fuhito had met an untimely end after an ambitious attempt to merge with one of the WEAPONs. Perhaps he could make a few adjustments to avoid that outcome.

"Your ability to press on despite difficulties and outside distractions has been something I've tried very hard to emulate."

"Yes, yes," he said feeling pleased. "A willingness to try anything despite any cowardice or lack of dedication from those around you is quite essential for this line of work." He flipped on one of the computers as he passed by. His concept for the personality transplant into digital form had only been in its most initial stages but he'd acquitted the simulation with a more complete version. He'd need to sit down and work the bugs out of the program quite soon.

"I see you've been doing some long term work with those two specimens. I hope the results have been favorable."

"Such a shame, that. At this point they do both have sufficient skills in place for admirable combat readiness, but they are quite unruly once they get out of a controlled environment. They're going to be terminated." He moved across the room to the selection of poisons, searching for just the right variety.

"Pity. Your ability to move on from a project is nothing less than admirable though. I've found your methods to be an inspiration. The way you deal with your work, your associates, and those brash enough to compete with you."

"Indeed," he chuckled, momentarily distracted to more triumphant times. Gast had really made it too easy by leaving the company and harboring a Cetra. Clearance for killing him had been issued before he'd even thought to ask for it. Neutralizing Hollander had been more difficult, though it had been satisfying to see the man eventually struck down in the simulation. He'd have to make some adjustments to get that same result. All in all, he had an excellent appraisal of how future events would occur and would be able to prepare everything necessary with a little thought-

Something sharp and sliding touched his back. It slipped all the way through until he could see steel streaming in scarlet.

Fuhito's voice flowed over his shoulder, as smooth and adoring as ever. "It's always been my goal to follow as closely in your footsteps as possible."

* * *

A/N: As stated above, this premise was originally developed by HazzaTL3 who was then gracious enough to let me take over. Next chapter is already well underway, though fast updates are not what I'm known for. This chapter is more Adventure/Drama, but there are a lot of humorous situations coming up, hence the Adventure/Humor category. Thanks for reading!


	2. Opportunity Cost

**Back to Reality**

_Chapter Two: Opportunity Cost_

By FullMentaPanic

Original Concept HazzaTL3

Mako did not numb. It overwhelmed. Sensations, smells, and thoughts until you caved and shut down under the assault. It was something he'd been hoping never to re-experience. He blinked again, thinking that whatever had happened might be reversed, but he was still immersed in green. Trickling laughter, screams, shouts, whispers, explosions, music, and howls into his ears. Filling his nose with fumes of sweat, sweetness, blood, smoke, and salt water. Touching his skin with leather, claws, fists, knives, stone, fur, heat, and ice. Casting shadows in his eyes of trees, monsters, buildings, flowers, fire, people he knew and others that he'd never encountered. None of them matched up. He tasted ash while seeing running streams, hearing wailing children, smelling gun oil, feeling teeth sinking into him. Through it all his mind twisted in bitterness, anger, disappointment, laughter, terror, indecision, affection, disgust, sorrow, love, despair, hope, hate.

He pushed forward and his arms slammed against something immovably stiff and smooth. Rock, glaciers, metal. He moved back and hit the same unyielding surface. Images still ghosted in front of him, but nothing seemed to reach past the frictionless jade around him. Faces, fields, and mountains fell back as he turned to them, but still hovered on the edges of his vision. He was trapped in a space less than his arm span. Trapped alone. His feet weren't touching anything, but he still kicked out and the apparitions of all that wasn't there scattered as his boots struck the hard walls of his prison. He froze as his frantic eyes swept over his feet. He hadn't worn those mass-issued infantry boots in years. Not since -

No.

Not again.

He couldn't be here again. He couldn't deal with the smells and the touch and the whispers that tore him in a thousand different directions until there was nothing left of himself. Not again. The way every time he hit the walls around him it echoed back only once as a dull thump before morphing into explosions, punches, rock slides, and crumpling metal. This couldn't be his life again. Pounding followed him everywhere he turned, pulling at his skull. Except...there. It was something steady. He stopped thrashing and wrenched himself to his left, zeroing in on the sound that intermittently seemed like it could actually come from something striking the smooth sides of his cell.

Foggy green clouded over the curving surfaces around him, and he struggled to see past it for something that wasn't Mako induced. He needed a focal point, something he knew was real and immovable. Although...if he couldn't find one, maybe he wasn't even here. Maybe he could go back. He strained through the murky liquid and stared down the shadows beyond, daring the dark lines to settle into -

Zack.

Hanging unconcernedly in a vat of green goop with that easy grin that seemed to be what his face naturally fell into when it relaxed.

_Alive._

Now he wanted this to be real. This was something he could center on. His head conked against the side of the tube and he bounced back before he completely mashed his face against it. Zack laughed soundlessly, and Cloud didn't care. Every other sense clamoring for his attention in the Mako soup, even the ones involving Zack, paled before the solid assurance that his friend was right in front of him.

Dipping his chin down, Zack raised his eyebrows before tilting his head to the side. Cloud nodded, he was definitely ready to get out of here. Even if he was still seeing the world through a chartreuse lens, he could now see it clearly enough to know that the room beyond them was empty, which was very unlikely to last. Bracing his back against one side and pushing against the other with his legs, Cloud poured every wish he'd ever had for saving the people who mattered to him into his muscles. Nothing happened. It had haunted his nightmares, but he hadn't merely cringed away from it. He'd wracked himself trying to figure out how he could have acted differently, what else he could have done. Which meant he had half a dozen plans up his half-sleeves for breaking out. With a twist and a tug, he detached one of the metal shoulder guards from his uniform and drove it against the clear material he was encased in. It couldn't possibly be glass, or it would have broken already. He glanced over. Zack had also apparently spent some time on alternative ways of getting out.

Wedged at the very top, Zack was pushing at the area where not-glass switched to metal. Cloud had considered that himself. The hollow cylinders weren't as well anchored at the top. It was one of the areas more likely to give under an attack. On top of that, pressure at the top could possibly lever enough force at the bottom to crack the containment tube. Though anything they tried to throw against it was hampered by heavily concentrated Lifestream, viscous and clinging. The cylinder didn't budge, even when Cloud could hear the muffled impact of Zack's shoulder against it. He looked at the clear barrier in front of him. It wasn't even scratched. With snowballing alarm, he tried to cram the pauldron into one of the seams where the tube would open, but it scraped ineffectually away. He braced the metal against his fist and punched. The epaulet cracked, but the wall wasn't even scuffed. He tore the metal apart the rest of the way, hoping for an edge he could jam into something.

A sharp tap swung his head back to the other containment tube where Zack was giving him a steady look and then a slow smile bracketed by a thumbs up. It didn't really mean everything was fine, but it did ease him just a bit and that feeling immediately swelled into reminders of open skies, work finished, beaches - he snapped his attention back to where it mattered.

Zack kept the smile in place and reached down to rap his knuckles against the grating at the bottom of his cylinder. It was filled with narrow openings already. Maybe they could tear through that, and even if they couldn't break completely out that way, if they could just get the Mako out they'd be able to get up the momentum to hit the clear barriers a lot harder.

Cloud turned to ramming an edge of his torn shoulder guard into one of the slotted grate openings. It fit easily enough, and he slowly started easing it sideways hoping the floor would give before the epaulet. He kept an eye on Zack to measure the other's success. Zack had maneuvered off the metal emblem that was usually centered on the defensive band around his middle. Besides marking the wearers as SOLDIER, those emblems were designed to do the job of completely shielding the vitals they covered and were the result of lots of gil, research, and only the most top tier materials. The grating visibly dented under the emblem where Zack smashed it into the floor, too impatient to fit it into a crevice. The sieved flooring warped and stretched, then abruptly broke away from where Zack was levering it up. Funding the infantry wasn't the highest on the priority list. The metal epaulet in Cloud's hand snapped.

Cloud rotated to another sharp edge and wedged and lifted a little more slowly to prevent tearing. He looked back to the side where, with a few more squeezes, there was a jagged edged, oblong opening in the grate. Zack hunkered down next to it in a floating crouch, peering into the mechanism under the slotted metal. Cloud bobbed to the top of the tank he was in for an angle where he could see what Zack was looking at. There was a spasm of confusion across his face before Zack jerked his head to the side and resumed a slight smile. Cloud clamped down on his own worm of fear and started thinking of stop valves and piping and – there.

He tapped against the side of the tube urgently with his ragged shoulder guard. Zack's face snapped up, and Cloud gestured and then chopped through the Mako with his torn pauldron. Zack's face lit up and he reached down to an area of the inner piping before looking back at Cloud, who motioned toward himself. They were currently bathing in the stuff, but Mako was not cheap. If Zack could cut the line beyond where the stop valve was and Mako started leaking out without being prompted by the system mechanics, there might be a safe guard that would safely drain away the rest of the liquid rather than losing it. It could also just have an emergency shut off valve to keep any more of the liquid from leaking. Either one probably came with an alarm.

Zack readjusted and slashed.

Cloud felt a plunge of horror when nothing happened. Zack wasn't finished though, and jammed the SOLDIER emblem deep where he'd hacked with both hands before wrenching it upwards. Cloud watched stiffly, until an unobtrusive bulb on the base of the cylinder blinked red and the Mako started to drain. Right, the tubing could have been initially crushed shut rather than sliced open with the blunt edges Zack was using.

By the time Zack straightened, he was head and shoulders above the waterline, and promptly sneezed. Condensed Lifestream looked really similar to snot.

Cloud gave an extremely Mako muffled chortle. Zack shot him a smirk and shook off his boots even though Mako was flowing down him heavily from pretty much everywhere. One of Zack's legs bent abruptly and he leaned against the side of the tube before looking at Cloud with a blazing grin, coughed, spat, and said, "So how about we take our lives back, Spike?"

Cloud smiled like he hadn't since he couldn't remember when.

Pushing himself back to his feet, Zack flicked Lifestream off a section of the transparent tubing, and then punched.

There had been times when Cloud had seen Zack lay out a behemoth with nothing but his fists, although it had been a dare and taken fifteen minutes straight of pummeling. Still, meeting Zack had been the first time he'd seen the power of SOLDIER in all it's jaw dropping strength. Of course, Zack was still inside an unbroken containment tube. That was alright though, because there was a crack.

So it wasn't a one punch job. It would only take a few minutes and Zack could open Cloud's tube from the outside with just the control panel, and he could get out the conventional way.

Which was when a legion of guards burst into the room.

Cloud dove back to the bottom grate and jabbed his partially shredded pauldron at the floor. Zack launched himself against the upper side of his prison, and this time with all the uninhibited power of his legs behind it. The bottom side of the tube next to Cloud gave a strained whine. He glanced furiously back at the guards as Zack continued with his tactic. About ten guards rushed toward them only to be yanked back by their comrades who whispered harshly in words muffled by distance, not-glass, and Lifestream. Zack jumped again, and the lower side of the tube crackled and splintered in a half circle around the bottom. Squinting through his overstimulated eyes and the wavering image through the barrier, Cloud saw every one of the guards slip a mask over the lower half of their face that wasn't covered by their helmets. There was a violent crash as Zack hit the top half of his cell and the lower half split while the whole structure started to tip. One of the guards flipped a panel up on the wall and brought his fist down on a dark button.

Zack's containment tube crashed to the floor, but Zack had already shot out of the bottom, and the nearest guard opened fire. Apparently that wasn't allowed, as half of the infantrymen shouted until the guard jumping the gun reluctantly took his finger off the trigger. It had been enough to divert the beeline Zack had been making for Cloud, though. Zack had dived away from the spray of bullets, and landed wrong and sprawled into an uncontrolled roll that crashed him into the opposite wall. Cloud stilled in shock as Zack awkwardly raised himself on an elbow and yanked the collar of his uniform over his nose.

Guardsmen stared down, weapons trained and unmoving, not one of them in range where Zack could attack. With slow deliberation, Zack rose to his feet, his eyes on the tensing mass by the door. It might have been the Mako, but it seemed that even over the distance Cloud could hear the creak of metal as the horde tightened their grip. Zack edged a foot forward into a fighting stance, and then collapsed.

_He's faking_. Zack's face was turned toward him, slack and still. _He has to be faking_. No, it was real. The mob would descend and tear him apart right in front of Cloud's eyes. _Stop it_, he strangled the thought. Zack was faking, he was waiting until they got closer and he had a chance for taking them down. Cloud counted heartbeats while Zack lay still and none of the guards moved forward. Whether he was shamming or not, Zack couldn't hold his breath indefinitely. The only hue Cloud could distinguish was a greenish cast and he couldn't tell if Zack was going any other color from oxygen deprivation. Even if he was, it might just mean that the dark button poured out total body paralysis gas and Zack was slowly and inexorably suffocating. No, he was faking it. Unless the gas had straight out killed him. No, the guards were all waiting and they apparently weren't allowed to shoot, so the orders were probably to capture them alive. Unless Hojo just didn't want their bodies damaged by bullets. No, it was a bluff. He glared desperately at the guards, willing them to get close enough that Zack could take them down and prove he wasn't dying. All the ranks were hopelessly stationary and no one Cloud scanned over looked like they were even thinking of moving. Every one of them was uniformly fixed on Zack except -

He snapped back to the guard whose slightly different shade of scarf-life neck guard might have indicated that he was the captain of the unit. The almost entirely obscured face was toward Zack, but Cloud got the unshakeable feeling that the man's focus wasn't on Zack, but _him_.

He felt like cracking his head against the surface in front of him. If he looked like he was taking things calmly of course they would suspect something was going on.

_So freak out._

It wasn't at all hard to do. He'd been beating back panic ever since he woke up, now he let it sweep through him and take over. He opened his mouth, but his voice was gagged in thick liquid that streamed in cool tendrils past what was already warmed by his body. He raked his torn scrap of metal across the surface in front of him and smashed his fists, shoulders, forearms, and knees against it. The Mako swirled and agitated around him, turbulence cutting down the force he could throw against the clear barrier even further. He couldn't get out, Zack couldn't get up. The guards were coming for them, he could see them creeping around the the far corner of the room and he couldn't do anything to stop them. They were closing in on Zack, circling him. They would rip out his spine and cut off his feet so he couldn't escape, and all Cloud would be able to do was watch. He watched them crowd around, taking away Zack. He watched Zack's eyes flick open.

The lines in front of Cloud were immediately swept to the side and he had a brief flash of Zack pushing off the floor with one hand while his upper leg finished an arc that flung a handful of guards up to the ceiling. Whatever sanctions had been against it were either void or ignored, and the ranks against the wall opened fire. Zack had cleared out before a single finger tightened on the trigger, trailing in the wake of the men he'd thrown off him, which meant that Cloud had a perfectly unobscured view of the hail of bullets heading toward him.

They pinged against the transparent curve in front of him and fell uselessly aside. The barrier wall was barely smudged. He still felt like the first layer of his skin had vanished leaving raw nerves stretched before a knife. He looked past the blurred marks to let his focus latch onto something else, and saw Zack zipping under the thrown guards who were now heading to the ground after bouncing off the ceiling. Zack snagged one out of mid-air and dragged the hapless man along by his neck guard.

There were still a few rows of guards by the entrance, and Zack streaked toward them in a low run. Gleaming barrels were belatedly tracking downward when, even faster than his run, Zack launched off the floor and leapt over the helmeted heads. He crunched high onto the wall, slamming the slightly struggling, captured guard against the rock and wrapping his right hand around the metal tubing that led down to the dark button. Planting both feet beside his grip, he reared back, wrenching the piping free and kicking off the wall. Flipping backward, he landed rather unsteadily on his feet in front of the door. The guards were still turning to look where he had hit the wall.

Zack wasn't going to die.

Cloud dropped to the bottom of his tank, again digging his epaulet into the flooring. They would make it out of this. He would feel sun and wind and actually breathe air again. They could do this.

Zack ripped a hand over the face of the soldier he'd captured, then shoved. The man fell back, hands moving frantically over his face and scrabbling along the floor. Lying on the ground, the soldier was out of the line of fire that chased after Zack as he dashed to the right side of the room and skated behind Cloud's containment tube. Cloud looked over his shoulder as Zack staggered against the cylinder and pressed something over his nose and mouth. He'd stolen the infantryman's breath filter. Pulling in deep breaths, and still looking glassy eyed, Zack slid his left hand around the cylinder toward the controls.

Air ripped and roared as bullets rushed through it. Cloud jerked up in front of Zack even as half his brain realized that the cylinder would already block the storm. Zack snatched his hand out of the target zone, as the lines against the opposite wall fired by turn in staggered bursts that kept a steady hail in between Zack and the controls that would open the cylindrical cell. Switching to hold the breathing mask with his left hand, Zack leaned his back against the tube and braced his legs against wall. He pushed, and Cloud immediately set his arms against the opposite curve of the cylinder and did the same. Lead showered against the surface in front of him and he could feel the patter of the impacts and hear the explosive bangs swirling in the liquid around him. Through the metal flurry, he saw the guard Zack had swiped the breath filter from. The man had gone still except for the regular rise and fall of his chest; whatever was being pumped into the room wasn't lethal. Though it must have been insidious if all the guards were issued a specific breathing mask. The neck guard on the infantry uniforms could be pulled up and used as a basic air filter that was effective against most air-borne poisons present in the field. A tinkling pop alerted him that the tube was starting to give. He angled his head to the side as he put more effort into pushing, and saw the line of impacts from the bullets start to track around the curve of the cylinder.

There was a sharp hiss and Cloud spun to see Zack jerking to his left, a thin stream of blood flowing down his right arm. He dodged back almost instantly as a barrage of lead descended on the other side of the cylinder from the guards still located near the door. Turning his body sideways, Zack kept himself in a narrowing pocket of safety as the gunmen advanced around the barrier.

Zack looked through the translucent not-glass and green sludge at the soldiers closing in on him, then up at Cloud with tense eyes and taut skin. Cloud floated weightless and voiceless, his fists and that increasingly battered piece of metal against the clear wall in front of him. He could feel the phantom of every impact against the curving sides on his own skin, piercing and tearing, but it was only illusion. He wouldn't be able to block anything from hitting Zack.

Zack eyed the the impacts intently and Cloud knew he was gearing himself to reach through the hail for the button regardless of getting hit. Mutely, he shook his head furiously at Zack. His arm would be shredded to the bone or completely blown apart, and he wouldn't even be able to reach the controls without exposing his body as well.

Awkwardly, keeping his left shoulder to the barrier and his body restricted, Zack stretched and pressed his right forearm on the cell wall above his head. Cloud lifted his own arm, crossing it against Zack's through the transparent barrier. Over their arms, he looked down as Zack's eyes glinted in a smile hidden by the mask. Then gunfire met and ravaged the space in front of Cloud.

He flinched slightly as Zack's boots flashed past his face, Cloud twisted around tracking the dark bolt that had sprung up and over his tank. Zack swung off one of the hanging lights, that ripped out of the ceiling in a shower of sparks, and sailed over the gunfire rising to meet him to drop right in the midst of the guards by the wall. Cloud sank down again, striving to keep an eye on the action while still trying to maneuver the mutilated shoulder guard to pry up the flooring so he could damage the piping, get out, and help Zack.

In the close quarters, half the guards reached for their tonfa sticks. Zack was far faster, even with one hand occupied holding his breathing mask in place. Apparently ripping out the piping above that dark button hadn't stopped the flow of gas, or else there was still enough of it hanging in the room to make regular breathing hazardous. Zack was staying in the thick of the crowd. Cloud only saw flashes of a kick to a knee, a fist to the face, and an elbow to the gut. Why wasn't he going for more sweeping moves that could potentially knock back a half dozen guards per blow? Cloud flicked his eyes at the door, there was still a large number of guards to take down in that direction even after the ones by the wall were dealt with. The infantry members blocking the way out were completely orderly, lined in graduated rows from kneeling to full height, every one with the sights of their gun on the group by the wall.

Cloud whipped back to the steadily thinning bodies around Zack. Those guards weren't just an obstacle, they were cover. As soon as Zack finished with the infantrymen by the wall, the soldiers by the door were going to open fire on him. The guardsmen around the edges of the wall were already skirting away, leaving Zack more exposed. It also showed that Zack wasn't the only one giving it out.

It wasn't really slowing him down, but a rare tonfa would connect before its owner was flung to the ground. Cloud had only a moment to wonder how many hits Zack had taken that he hadn't seen before Zack was down to only one guard within arms reach. He literally threw the man at the infantry members backing away from him. Knocking over two of the strategic retreaters did eliminate gunfire from that quarter, but it was instantly released from nearly everywhere else.

Again, Zack had cleared out and avoided the bullets. All the guards who had fallen back from the wall were unloading cartridges, but only half of the men located near the door could fire without hitting their squad members. Zack twisted through the safe spots of negative space, no one who wasn't exceptional or Mako treated would be able to track him fast enough to actually aim where he was or would be. There was a heavy landing before Zack was whooshing away again, and Cloud was left staring at several scattered drops of dark liquid.

Blood. It could just be from the wound on his arm. Cloud swept over him and did see blood on his arm...both his arms. Maybe it was just a lucky shot. Cloud's eyes darted to the gunman. None of them were following Zack with their weapons; they weren't even trying. They all seemed to be firing steadily at designated spots. There weren't enough of them to fill the entire room with lead, and Zack was left with maneuvering through the small areas they didn't have enough people to rain bullets in. It was obviously tight, but Zack would be able to figure out the pattern and -

Abruptly, ever barrel shifted minutely. Zack contorted in mid-air to avoid the sudden change in the sequence of fire. Cloud watched closely, easing with each miss, and tensing with the single hit. Cloth ripped as a shot tore through fabric on the back of Zack's leg right above his boot. The bullet didn't lodge, it carried on in shreds of trouser leg and tiny bits of Zack.

_It's not that bad,_ Cloud beat into his fracturing mind. Zack hadn't even flinched at being hit, he was on enough adrenaline and willpower that he'd be able to keep going for a while. Three hits was workable for the amount of time he was being shot at because eventually the guards would run out of bullets -

Infantry always carried at least fifteen extra clips. It was also entirely possible that these guards specifically carried more or had a stockpile close by.

They still had to reload. A few seconds would be more than enough time for Zack if he didn't have to worry about being shot at. At the rate they were popping lead, fresh rounds should start becoming necessary really soon. His insides leaped as he noticed a single ceasing of fire from one of the guards by the door. It was only one, but it was a harbinger for everyone else who was going to have to take time to reload and he scanned the rest of the combatants in anticipation of the next to give out - He whipped back to the first guard. The man had stepped back and was already slipping fresh ammo into place. The guards on either side had angled their weapons slightly, making up for the absence of fire so it was hardly noticeable. So there were only two soldiers capable of thinking on their feet, that didn't mean every other guard in the room would be able to compensate when bullets started running out.

Another guard ran out of ammunition, and Cloud eyed him hopefully, then his stomach iced over as the flanking guards adjusted their aim to compensate. These weren't randomly competent soldiers responding spontaneously. These were soldiers flawlessly following a preset plan to wear Zack down until he was blood running out of a human sieve.

Cloud found Zack again, touching down briefly on the back wall before shooting up to the ceiling to kick off and then hug the floor for a few running steps before jumping backward and arching over enemy fire. The pattern of screaming lead was being reworked too frequently and too continuously for Zack to do anything besides dodge. Guns were being re-armed too systematically to leave any openings. With every moment, the guards who had been next to the wall were moving further away, allowing more of the soldiers by the door to bring their weapons to bear. Things couldn't last in this situation without getting worse. Cloud needed to become part of the equation. He gripped the shoulder guard in determination, and the metal squelched against the flooring and then crunched into unusable pieces.

One slot in the grating was lightly stretched. Cloud abandoned tools and attacked the bottom of the tube with his hands. His fingers mashed and wormed at the slender holes, skin crushing as he tried to pry up the flooring. Their was a dull tearing as his fingernails strained to rip up the metal as his hands pulled back. He had to get out. He could already see Zack being shredded, broken, and drained. He could see his back moving further and further out of reach to take on death while Cloud scrabbled to understand what was going on. He could feel the stark realization that Zack could _die_, was _dead, _and that Cloud had done _nothing_ to stop it and could do _nothing_ to change it.

A crumpling thump drew his attention upward, and he saw one of the retreating guards flat on his back with an extra helmet rolling past his head. Eyes roving again, Cloud latched onto Zack corkscrewing around the room with an infantry helmet clenched in his right hand. In one of the scratches of time when he landed against the far side of the room, Zack whipped away his breathing mask to fling Cloud a confident grin and a shout that easily competed with the hammering noise of the room.

"Happy thoughts, Cloud!"

Then Zack was zooming away again, nailing one of the shooters by the entrance with the thrown helmet in mid-leap.

A hurried search of the ground showed some downed guards by the far wall, headgear missing. The SOLDIER swooped in to wrench another helmet free before being forced into evasive maneuvers again without being able to launch it at anyone. At the very least this would buy them some time, Cloud thought with settling control. His reconstructing hope was demolished as an explosion lit up the room.

He scanned the world outside his cell until his vision filled with a portion of the floor that was crackled and blackened. Gunfire and Zack still careened around the room, but Cloud's attention was on the ravaged ground and several grenades serenely rolling along as they ticked down to implosion. Seconds stretched and he switched back to the few guards who had hurled the hand-held bombs. They were utilizing the same cover method for reloading to gain the space to arm and throw the grenades. He blinked as a harsh flash dominated his green surroundings before he focused on more spots where the surface of the ground was cracked and torn by powerful blasts. Powerful enough to make a dent in a stubborn containment tube.

With determined purpose, he banged on the sides of his prison, trying to draw Zack's attention. His own focus on his friend, Cloud caught the moment when Zack's eyes cast toward him, despite how one of them was upside down at the time. Hoping Zack would be able to follow what he needed while slipping in between bursts of lead and explosions, Cloud hurriedly mimed pulling a pin with his teeth, throwing it at the foot of the tube, the ensuing blast, and how it would leave the circular cell weakened enough to break out of. As Zack continued to weave around the room during and after the charade-like explanation, Cloud wondered if he should keep on demonstrating or assume that Zack had understood and not risk the guards discovering what he was planning by further acting it out.

He was looking longingly at a couple of rolling grenades when Zack passed right next to them and sent them flying toward Cloud with a low kick. They bounced lightly off the tube and clunked into the narrow space between the metal bases of his own prison and Zack's. The guards near Cloud's cylinder scrambled back and he pulled his arm over his eyes as light and sound erupted in front of him with shattering force. Looking up, his entire field of vision was fractured. Lines criss-crossed and skated over the containment tube, rallying in near white concentration at the location where the bombs had gone off. It was enough.

Planting his back on the unbroken wall, he delivered a two-footed kick against the network of cracks. There was a crunch, then concentrated Lifestream was spraying out of the tube in thin sheets. Streaming bubbles streaked inside as Mako flowed out. Looking at the shiny pockets of space, his elation staggered. If air was getting into the tube then poison gas was coming with it. Could it mix with the green liquid and be absorbed into his skin regardless of whether he inhaled it or not? Getting out suddenly became even more necessary.

Again, he kicked both feet, and the buckling barrier gave way under them. With a jolt he realized that his left heel was actually _outside_. Reluctantly, he drew it back against the slopping pull of exiting Mako. The hole was nowhere near large enough for him to squeeze out of and he needed to escape the possibility of poison sinking into his skin _now_. A buoyant jump pushed him to the top, and he crammed and braced himself into the small circle of space above the waterline. He wasn't sure if the emergency draining mechanism had switched on, but the level of liquid was still dropping rapidly. One jumping tic of his pulse later, and the only Lifestream he was still touching was that dripping off him.

Mako didn't hold with a graceful departure. Like it knew it was losing its hold, it kicked up a final ruckus as it slid off. Human mutters and animal howls rose and then dropped away. Hot wind and freezing metal dug and dragged along his back and limbs before falling into nothingness. Sensation still clung and seared in damp remnants on his flesh and clothing, but it was overpowered by the staggering appearance of _color_ before his still bleary eyes. Colors besides the green wraith-like shades that were streaming away as he blinked, casting his fairly accurate perception of the room around him into confusion with the unveiling banners of sight. Light was in his eyes, air was on his skin, and with it came the overwhelming desire to just breathe.

_Later, _he commanded his wet lungs. Twisting his head over his shoulder, he saw that the draining system must have engaged after all since the containment tube was completely empty. He swung his legs free from where they were braced and then dropped. The battered opening in the cell was directly before him, but he hurriedly reared back from it as clear chips of the transparent material careened into the tube as bullets flecked the outside walls.

It didn't seem like it was deliberate, he concluded after swift scrutiny of the gunmen, just a few stray bullets on the edge of the barrage against Zack. It was a reminder that now Cloud could actually be hit by them. The main focus of the room still seemed to be on Zack, and Cloud tried to momentarily drag his attention away from that fact to ensure he was worth being considered a threat as well.

The hole in the containment tube was about knee high and he crouched before it. Carefully, he maneuvered his right hand and forearm past the jagged edges. He'd already knocked out the areas of not-glass that seemed most compromised, and hopefully this would be faster than spending time wearing down the rest of the wall. He stretched and inched his fingers up the outside of his cell, but he was angled wrong to reach where he needed to. Pressing closer, he slid his upper arm through so that his elbow could bend outside. The slight flex brought his bicep right against the sharpness waiting to lacerate him. He tried to relax the muscle while still pushing his hand toward the controls, which hopefully still worked.

Gloves, and then the pressure of his actual fingers were on the panel outside of his tube. Which button opened the door? There were two. Was it the right or the left? His right or left, or the right or left when someone was facing the controls? His jaw clenched, and the pressure seemed to pull a faint memory out of his head; outside right, his left. It was the harder of the two to reach.

His sleeve snagged on the toothy crags around the hole as he stretched out up to his shoulder. The side of his face was flush to the wall of his cell, and he stared at the blank back of the control panel while his fingers flailed on the opposite side for the button. He reached further, and his skin was pricked. Residual Mako slunk into the wound, and something depressed under his searching hand.

Prickling turned to a sharp bite and he instantly threw weight and muscle against the sliding panel to keep it from further slicing into his arm as it worked to open. With awkward haste, he slid his arm off the teeth of the opening and tried to retract the rest of his limb while still pushing with enough force to keep the door panel still. What if he saved his arm but burnt the motor on his way out? Skimming over the cutting surface, he looped back inside and his gloved hand bumped off the crags as the door wrenched away and open.

He lurched forward and all but fell out, and it was only when his hair was parted with lead that he remembered what had been going on outside his prison. Flattening himself in the dip in between his containment tube and the remnants of Zack's, he turned his head over to the door. He should have been lit up as soon as he was free of the cell the way people had been firing a little while ago.

The four guards who were all but directly to his right were sprawled on the ground. Hit, or thrown, or...something by Zack. Cloud was feeling a bit fuzzy. He needed cover. His eyes swung to his left and touched on a corner of Zack's fallen containment tube. He could use that.

Cloud darted around the broken bottom of the cylinder and hunkered down on the far side, only to find himself face to helmet with a pair of guards. He saw the barrel of a gun right in front of him coming towards his stomach, and then his fist crashing into the chest of the infantryman. The man flew backward into the one behind him. Their helmets cracked together and their bodies went sprawling well clear of the curved wall of the tube. That was good. They were knocked out and couldn't hurt Zack. They had also taken their breathing masks with them. That was bad. He probably should have grabbed one of those. He tried to steady himself with a hand against the tube but it slipped off. That was bad. Maybe he should sit down. All the colors and shapes were getting dim and dark. That was also bad -

Something clamped down over his mouth. Was that bad? He saw a familiar swoop of black spikes on the edge of his fading world.

That was good.

He breathed.

Warm air crept in his nose and mouth, and turned wetness into ripping fire in his lungs.

He lurched forward, coughing violently. Mako trapped in his body spewed out his nose and mouth, eked from his eyes. Air squeezed around it and burst into the far corners of his chest. Zack kept the mask steady against his face.

Cloud brought one hand up to the breath filter, and Zack drew back as Cloud pulled the mask away to fling green liquid out of it and hock Lifestream and sticky body fluids directly from his mouth. He brought the filter back. His insides were still slick with the unsettling textures and tastes of Mako, and his breath was still more knife-like than soothing, but he looked up to take stock of their situation.

All of the guards on their side of the containment tube were strewn across the floor of the lab. The rest of the guards had congregated by the door and were sending lead sailing through the breadth of the room now that they weren't trying to avoid any of their own side. The material of their former cells was just as stubborn as ever, and he could see the warped picture of the guards hammering lead uselessly through its clear surface. The lights of the room still left very few shadows, even with the swinging cord from the lamp Zack had ripped out still intermittently shooting hot flecks of light.

The was a brief cuff against the side of his head and he turned to see Zack drawing his hand back.

"Sparks."

Cloud stared stoically for a moment then wrung a clump of his hair so Lifestream dribbled off. "Wet." It wasn't going to be catching fire.

Zack shrugged in amicable apology and took the filter Cloud passed him. The back lines of the convexly stretched guards were starting to step around to the right. He and Zack were in prime position to be caught in right angles of fire if they didn't do something soon.

"Grenades."

Cloud looked back and Zack tapped the wrist holding the breath filter and looked at him expectantly. Cloud hesitantly held up three fingers, not entirely sure he knew what was being asked. Zack nodded and shoved against the right side of the fallen containment tube so it was at a slight angle, then leaned against it while leveling a look at Cloud before turning his eyes to the infantrymen on the left side of the doorway. Past experience with how Zack thought and what they needed now joined, and Cloud dipped his chin in agreement. Zack's eyes smiled over the filter, and he took a single prolonged breath.

The air filter was tossed to Cloud, and he caught and held it to his face while Zack stayed down in the cover of his old prison and reached back to close each hand around the ankle of a fallen guard. Zack hauled the two against the side of the tube, and the activity of the guards moving to surround them kicked up their pace a notch. Zack's hands flew around the belts of the two infantrymen and ripped two grenades from the first and one from the second. He crammed and balanced all three into his right hand then straightened and turned so that he fully faced the gunmen by the door. He hooked his fingers through the circles of the pins, and with an exaggerated motion that could be seen even through the distortion of the clear cylinder, he pulled them all out.

_One._

The slight tension when Zack first pulled the pins broke into visible wavering while the SOLDIER cooked the grenades.

_Two._

With an underhanded chuck that didn't remove him from cover, Zack lobbed the grenades at the guards directly in the doorway. They scattered and dove out of the way, mostly to the left, and Cloud launched his foot against the containment tube, sending it in a flying spin towards the left hand guards. There was a narrow avenue to the doorway completely free of infantry, and the ones on the left at least were going to be distracted for a bit. Cloud closed his eyes.

_Three._

Black turned to red, and he dashed forward with his eyes still shut. There was a flash of cooling heat on his skin, and he cracked his lids just in time to avoid colliding with Zack's back as he yanked aside the darkly scorched, askew door. Cloud could practically feel the sights lining up on him as the guards recovered from the bang of the triple explosion, and then he and Zack slid around the door in the same motion and slammed it shut behind them.

* * *

A/N: Well that update took longer than it should have. This chapter was actually cut in half on the recommendation of three or four people who said it was just exhaustingly long. The other half will go up in a few days. Huge thanks to everyone for reading, reviewing, favoriting, and following; and to HazzaTL3 for creating a ready made fan base to tap into! Lest you think Shinra Infantry trains at the Stormtrooper School of Markmanship, please recall how Zack fought that platoon of soldiers in "Last Order". I propose that he would have been doing even better against the guards if he wasn't handicapped with sustained inactivity and fighting with one hand in a poison gas filled environment. I estimated how long the grenades take to go off, but I think I'm pretty close. Chapter Three coming soon, basically as soon as I come up with a good title.


	3. Rude Awakening

**Back to Reality**

_Chapter Three: Rude Awakening_

By FullMentaPanic

Original Concept HazzaTL3

Cloud shoved the breathing mask at Zack then pulled his neck guard over the lower half of his face. He felt the distinctive scratchiness that meant there was still poison in the surrounding air. Zack seemed to have figured that out as well and kept a firm hold on the filter.

"Keep holding the door," Zack muffled through the mask while Cloud realized he had his own hand still clamped around the doorknob. "We need to block this."

Cloud aligned the door so it sat snugly in its frame again then leaned back and settled his feet as Zack ran to the right to find something to use as a barricade. It wasn't containment tube grade, and would be completely unhinged if he wasn't holding it in place, but the door was reinforced enough that Cloud wouldn't have to worry about being shot through it. He straightened his arms as far as they would go to try to follow what Zack was doing. There were some odd pieces of storage off to the side of the cavern, but nothing singularly big enough to block the entire entryway before the door.

He shot a glance backward through the wide hallway. It was quite a ways to the other side, they might possibly make it before any of the guards got into the cavern if they just bolted. Or they might have been able to make it if they'd simply ran while half the guards were explosion dazed. Still, getting shot in the back was distinctly unpleasant and not something he wanted to go through again...had that actually happened?

A bitten off exclamation had Cloud's attention whipping to his right. Zack was backing away from the wall, pulling something down, and massive folded steel glinted. The Buster Sword. Zack's sword.

"Get ready to jump back!" Zack called before throwing off the mask to curl both hands around the hilt of his weapon.

Cloud released one hand from the door handle to snag the filter. Even with just his left hand securing it, the jumbled tugs to pull open the door from the opposite side didn't come close to upsetting his hold. He braced himself a second later, like irony had just been waiting for him to let his guard down before the soldiers figured out how to have more than one or two people at once haul on the door.

There was a scuffing run behind him, and he looked back just as Zack launched himself off the floor. The Buster Sword flashed and then was buried nearly to the hilt in the ceiling. Zack wrenched his arms across his body and a virtual trench sliced three, five, seven feet long. Cloud let go and rushed clear as the blade swung free and Zack landed in a crouch.

The door was pulled back, out of its frame, and a chorus of surprise showed that none of the guards had been expecting it, but nothing else happened.

"Come _on_!" Zack leaped again, arcing the sword in an angle and ripping it across the rocky ceiling two feet in front of the first cut. He rotated with the swing of the blade, then kicked brutally against the suspended slab. The two sections at the ends of the long cuts cracked. The door was thrown aside, and Cloud had a moment of eye contact with the guard who he now had the color perception to tell really was in command of the unit, before the sliced length of stone and debris crashed down into the entryway.

Zack settled on the ground awkwardly and stumbled back a few steps on his heels. Cloud took it in with surprised unease as they turned to finally dash to the other side of the chamber. The weirdness spiked as Zack flipped his sword over his shoulder to settle on his back _without_ any of his usual flourish. Zack was not on top his game right now. His own ankle nearly twisted when he tripped on absolutely nothing, and he concluded that neither was he.

Even so, they were almost halfway across the basement cavern. Progress that was marked by passing the door on their right -

"Vincent!"

Zack pivoted at Cloud's shout before his feet caught up to the action, momentarily skidding to his knees before scrambling over to Cloud who threw the filter at him and rattled the doorknob with both hands. It was locked. He couldn't remember the combination on the safe that held the key. They didn't have time to go through the ridiculously lengthy process of deciphering the code. He wasn't even sure if he could remember all the steps involved -

He paused when Zack's hand clapped on his shoulder, and then the handle was torn from his grip as Zack's First Class boot collided with the door and sent it flying into the dusty, coffin filled crypt. Cloud bounded to the center casket where he knew Vincent slept, and then hesitated. He had the pressing feeling that he should knock before he opened it. How was he going to explain this with the fewest words possible anyway? Vincent might have been knocked out by the gas and unconscious, though. He tried to recall if the sarcophagus itself was locked. Zack cleared his throat pointedly, and Cloud abandoned time-wasting musing and crushed his fingers through the top of the pall box. If there was a lock, it was ripped away with the rest of the lid as he tore the cover off.

The coffin was completely empty.

Cloud's face slackened around his widening eyes. Where was Vincent? Cloud wasn't entirely clear on their situation, but he'd subconsciously assumed that if he and Zack were still in the Shinra basement then Vincent would be too. Had Cloud simply been captured again by some deranged members of the Shinra science department after that Deepground business? Why was Zack still alive then? What had actually happened? What about what he'd thought had been happening for the past three years of his life? Was that a dream? A hallucination? A trick?

A blast rocketed and echoed outside the burial room as the floor and walls rumbled around them. Whatever had happened, what was happening _now_ was real. They had used the grenades to break down his containment tube, and he was certain the guards had just used them as dynamite against the blockage in the entryway. Unless he and Zack wanted to donate their corpses to this catacomb, they needed to get out before the room turned into a deathtrap. He was a step away from the doorway when he realized Zack wasn't with him.

He spun to see the wild darkness of Zack's head hovering and tilted to one side over the top of one of the caskets as Zack rapped his knuckles against the side. Whatever he was looking for apparently wasn't there, and he hopped to another coffin to repeat the process. Maybe Vincent was just in another one of the caskets or had been moved to a different part of the room, Cloud thought with a buoyant surge. Zack tapped one of the left-hand coffins and Cloud heard a faint buzz.

Instead of opening it, Zack slung his free arm around the casket and lifted the entire unwieldy shape. "Pick up the door!"

Cloud grabbed the unhinged door from the back wall and rushed back to where Zack was standing just inside the entrance of the room.

"Keep that in front of you," Zack instructed, then flung the casket out the doorway and toward the lab.

A shattering crunch sounded that was quickly suppressed by a grating hum and clattering flutter. Shouts of confusion mixed with insect-like shrilling while Cloud and Zack locked eyes before bolting out into the cavern. Cloud held the door lengthways through the exit, but switched it to its normal positioning, which was both taller and broader than he was, once they were clear of the door frame. He caught a flash of huge beetles wreaking havoc with clacking pincers and spraying acid before the door blocked his line of sight and he focused on reaching the ladder leading out of the lower levels.

The pandemonium behind them was being beaten down with gunfire, and Cloud curled his fingers tighter around the edges of the door. He was running right in Zack's wake, providing cover for both of them, and they were so close to the ladder. There was a reverberating line of thunks against the barrier Cloud held and Zack leaped onto the ladder, nearly cracking his head on the ceiling. He jumped again, pushing off the rungs with his feet and disappearing up the shaft without bothering to use his hands.

Scattered impacts were turning into steady hail against the door, and Cloud carried it with him while he made his own leap onto the ladder. Once there, he stalled. The door might fit into the vertical passageway between the basement and the next level, but he was having a hard time balancing on the ladder while holding onto it. Plus he was starting to feel lightheaded again. Seconds later he dropped the door entirely and nearly slipped off the rungs himself as the metal in front of him screeched and then shot upward with him clinging to it. Looking up to see Zack hauling the whole structure, he saw that the SOLDIER had wrenched the ladder off the wall of the shaft.

The upward progress jammed to a halt as the top of the ladder ran into the ceiling. Cloud was halfway out the hole leading to the basement floor and swung himself clear easily. His landing was decidedly sloppy though.

"Hold these." Zack thrust the breathing mask into his hands and gestured at the ladder.

Cloud supported one side of the ladder and deeply drew in the relief of the breath filter. The shift in Zack's stance drew his attention, and he glanced over as Zack sprang off the floor. Leaning back in the air, Zack hit the ceiling feet first and apparently found something to momentarily brace against as he swiveled his boots. Before gravity could call him back to the ground, he grabbed the top rung of the ladder and kicked off the ceiling, dragging the ladder down with him.

The metal structure at Cloud's feet immediately angled while he kept his own grasp firm but non-intrusive. There was a whining shriek as the ladder dug into the side of the rocky shaft before the metal strained and snapped. Cloud darted down to snag one of the lower rungs before the bottom half of the structure could plummet back to the basement floor. Looking down the hewn sides of the shaft, his eyes were directly on the infantryman who skidded into the circular view, raising his gun.

Backpedaling, Cloud hastily pulled the ladder with him as bullets rattled loudly up from the opening in the floor. He dropped his burden once it was clear of the hole, and then felt a firm hand on his shoulder as Zack tugged him around.

Zack tossed his chin toward the spiraling wooden staircase that led up to the mansion and said emphatically, "Run. _Don't _stop," then lifted his sword off his back.

Cloud felt like strangling him. Instead, he clamped his free hand on Zack's sword arm and hollered, "You are _not_ staying here to fight them!"

He felt warm reassurance and more than a little bafflement when Zack looked genuinely surprised. Managing a close-mouthed, slightly self-deprecating smirk, Zack shook his head.

The angle of Zack's body was completely toward the exit rather than the entrance to the lab level, Cloud noticed. If Zack said he wasn't going to stay and fight, then he wasn't going to stay and fight. Then why -

Zack jerked his head toward the stairs again, and Cloud took off. The difference between his feet hitting the hard surface of the landing and the softer wood of the stairs seemed huge as he opened all his senses to try to find out what Zack was planning. Therefore, it was unnaturally loud when the scream of fast-splintering lumber screeched in his ears.

Gritting his teeth, he didn't look back, but sprinted faster until he was high enough on the curving stairway that he could see Zack just by glancing down. The Buster Sword was being dragged almost like a rudder, slicing its way through the stairs behind Zack's running steps. Even with twisting the blade occasionally to be certain the wooden structure was detaching and crashing down to the bottom of the tower, Zack was rapidly making it up the staircase.

Cloud whipped back to what was in front of him and slid to a halt in front of the hidden door that separated the main house from the bottom floors.

It was closed.

He had never opened it from this side before. Running his eyes, then his hand over the wall, he probed frantically for whatever was supposed to release the door. Maybe it couldn't be opened from this side at all.

"Duck!"

He dropped and threw his gaze to his left. Without slowing, Zack shifted his sword from wood to stone, and directly moved the blade from the stairs to the wall. It slashed above Cloud's head then tore into open space...and kept going. Zack struggled with the whole of his weight and the heft of the Buster Sword leaning over the depths to the lower levels.

Cloud dug one hand into stricken masonry and let the breathing mask fall as he latched onto Zack's arm. He hauled back and felt the firmness of the wall against his side for one moment before it gave way and he and Zack fell through and sprawled in the shower of broken stones.

They were actually in the manor. They were outside of the lab and the basement. That was a real rug scratching into his face, real shattered masonry trapped under and scattered on top of his body, and real rocky dust itching his ears. He was actually hearing that pulsing drumbeat of life coming from Zack. They were both alive and they were both, mostly, out.

Could they start really breathing now? He tested the air with his neck guard. A lot of crumbled pebbles rubbed uncomfortably against his face, but the texture of the treated fabric itself seemed fine. Carefully, he took a shallow, dusty breath. It didn't make him feel woozy, but it did tickle in the back of his throat. Even if the air was mostly safe up here, the broken door leading to the decimated staircase could still be leaking gas into the room.

Zack climbed and swayed to his feet in the rubble. His grin was startlingly white next to the smudged grime and trails of sweat on his face as he stepped over to one of the windows. The possibility of fresh air had Cloud propping himself up to sit while he shook chunks of rock off his head. Now that the severe necessity of getting free had started to ebb, he was aware that his stomach felt disturbingly sloshy and like sticky footed bugs were rolling snowballs spiked with glass around his belly. It seemed like something was trying to crawl into the cut in his arm.

"Right."

The soft and slightly annoyed word pulled Cloud to his feet, and he clambered over the scree strewn floor next to Zack. He looked out the window, and he forgot to breathe in the blessed powdery air. There was the detached bathhouse and the wide open yard of the mansion, and on top of that, the place was a bristling campground filled with infantry. There was something partially obscured by a tent that looked like a guard scorpion. The whole site was also alive with activity; commanders prodding their inferiors into place, guns unslinging, and a group of about twenty stalking to the front of the manor. He and Zack exchanged a look and stepped back from the window.

"I think we'll go out the other side of the house," Zack said decisively and swung his sword to his back.

They struck a fast jog out of the room, and Cloud distantly noted that there were a lot more beds crammed into the space than he remembered, and in the room after that.

"I bet the officers all get dibs on sleeping inside," commented Zack lowly.

"So many?"

"They beefed up security since we got out so easy last time."

Cloud staggered as they hit the stairs of the landing that separated the east and west wings of the house. "That happened?"

"Think it was a simulation."

To their left, the front doors crashed open, and a shout of authority heralded in a stream of guards.

"We'll figure it out later," Zack offered as they streaked to the first door on their right and bullets turned the stained window on the landing into a waterfall of colored glass.

Cloud pushed the door shut behind them then jumped back as Zack upended one of the beds in the room and shoved it up against the door. Cloud grabbed the posts of another bed and hauled it over to brace against the first.

"What was in that safe again?"

He looked back at the dark metal box. "Summon. Odin? I don't remember the combination."

Zack gripped the handle of his sword. "Neither do I."

With a kick, he sent the safe skating into the middle of the room, then brought the edge of the blade down on it just behind the door. Apparently that monster that didn't seem like it could possibly fit in the safe got sliced as well, because it didn't come roaring into the room as the metal was slashed open. How much of what Cloud remembered actually mattered? A trickle of self-doubt swirled and sickened in his stomach.

Zack scooped up and pocketed the reddish materia that rolled in the safe. "Let's go!"

He leaped at one of the far left windows, bending his legs tight against his body and crossing his arms over his face. A rain of glittering shards chased after him as he broke free of the room.

Glass crunched under Cloud's boots as he looked down what seemed to be a good twenty feet to the ground below. Zack was bouncing on his feet, his head turned toward Cloud in fidgety eagerness.

"Come on!"

The rolling queasiness swelled. Had everything since their last 'escape' been fake? Had everything he'd worked and bled to build been fabrication? He had a detached impression of pounding steps in the hallway and then thumping and rattling at the bed-braced door.

"Cloud, jump!"

"I've never done something like this before."

"WHAT! I've seen you go up and down over a hundred stories while battling a bahamut!"

"That was the simulator. Not really me."

"That's the simulator they use for ALL SOLDIER training! It's pretty accurate."

"..."

"Look, I 'll catch you."

He was not going to be caught. Glaring until Zack lowered his arms, he jumped before he had time to talk himself out of it. Wind rushing in his ears triggered something and he almost automatically tucked into a flip and landed only a little unsteadily next to Zack.

Cloud blinked. "I did it."

"You're awesome. Let's move!"

His feet were driving into the loam of the mountain as they ran between the wall of the house and the tall rocky slopes that surrounded it. The air was cool and moist. Everything was a little misty under the soft gray of the low hanging sky. What time of day was it? He couldn't see the sun. They were pelting toward the wall that blocked off the manor from the trails between Nibelheim and the reactor that wound in the valleys below the steep cliffs. They could make it before any of the guards on the far side of the house could react. So long as they didn't use the gate. They reached the wall and he vaulted while Zack leapt.

He heard multiple clicks, and he felt like he was being pulled into slowness as he turned his head to the left while sailing over the barrier. There were a handful of sweeper mechs, stationed on the trail side of the wall and on the far side of the gate. He could the see the arms moving back sluggishly from the recoil of firing. He could see the bullets themselves plowing through molasses air to the area where he and Zack were about to land.

One hand latched onto the top of the wall as the other wrapped around Zack's shoulder, before he yanked both of them back to the yard while lead ripped in front of them. Zack skidded backward in a crouch after landing and Cloud slipped on impact to crash to his side. They were still up and running to the meager cover behind one of the scattered evergreens half a breath later. With the dark green branches deceptively blocking out the rest of the grounds, Zack pivoted to face him, cupping his hands and hitting a low stance.

Cloud slowed briefly in his run, then turned to full speed and pulled up a leg to step onto Zack's hands. Zack heaved, at the last moment Cloud added the force of his own muscle to the movement, and then he was launched into the sky. The cliff-face that towered above them instantly flicked by, as did the top of the cliff itself, and several dozen feet of open air after that. Maybe he shouldn't have added his own jump into the mix, he considered as he hung suspended for a heartbeat before gravity yanked him back toward the very far away ground. The nausea raging in the pit of his gut agreed.

He tried to get control of the fall, to twist in a pattern that would allow him to meet the cliff top leaping toward him without getting lethal shin splints. It seemed to work for a while, then his feet slammed into the ground and his body bent to absorb the impact. His knees and the tops of his thighs jammed against his chest and stomach, sending the splashy contents straining for a way out. He leaned forward on his hands and threw up.

His stomach was twisting around his spine in its roiling efforts to squeeze everything out of itself. He was going dizzy from lack of air before the clenching muscles relaxed enough for him to breathe, and then they started spasming again. Dimly, he was aware of the scuffling arrival of Zack. A last knotting of his gut seemed to indicate the end and he looked up while acid burned his mouth to see nothing but Zack and the endless ranges of mountains past the height of the cliff.

"Do you feel better?"

"A little," Cloud gasped past quivering lips, pulling in the clean sweetness of the air and noting that he felt...quieter.

"Okay then." Ripping off a glove, Zack jammed the bare hand into his own mouth and to the back of his throat, barely whipping it out before his gagging broke into vomiting.

"Zack!"

"We're probably going to have to deal with this stuff coming out both ends for awhile," Zack panted over splattered Mako and bile. "Getting some of it out now might at least make it shorter."

Cloud dragged his arm over his mouth while Zack straightened.

"We need to keep moving. Where to, Cloud?"

"What?"

"We're in your backyard, buddy. This time around we're going to take full advantage of that."

* * *

A/N: Probably the fastest update you're going to see for awhile. I'm starting to think I should just change the category to Adventure/Friendship, but I'll see what the tone of the next chapter is before I do that. Thanks to everyone for their support, even if it's just a view! Feel free to speculate on where the story is going as I'm not quite sure where I want it to end up. I have several key events in mind, and what I want to happen in the next three chapters, but no definite conclusion.


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